Manifesta purposely strives to keep its distance from what are often seen as the dominant centres of artistic production, instead seeking fresh and fertile terrain for the mapping of a new cultural topography.

Manifesta 13 Marseille was one of the only international biennials to take place during the global pandemic COVID-19, the biennial ended earlier than planned due to the second national lockdown

NEsTWORK, NL

Programme at Zaal de Unie and Centrum Beeldende Kunst

This temporary Rotterdam-based group NEsTWORK, formed for Manifesta, consisted of several artists, a philosopher and a journalist. Their work was an investigation into “the local, the belonging somewhere”, and their intention was to supply practical information and resources to visitors to the city and to create a link between international and local communities. For the period of the biennial they hosted a daily programme in Zaal de Unie and in the documentation centre at Centrum Beeldende Kunst Rotterdam, as well as other events. The name NEsTWORK referred to the networking which linked the nested narratives of people from Rotterdam with the stories of guests from abroad.